Years ago, KSDS, a San Diego jazz station, always played a Frank Sinatra classic at 7:10 am, in a feature called Coffee with the Chairman.

No matter where I was "at" in my morning, I made sure I stopped for 2 minutes, coffee cup in hand, to savor that tune. I did that for a year, during a time I recall feeling unusually grounded. The Chairman likely helped with that by providing a mandatory AND enchanting (you know, like Witchcraft!) anchor for the day.

A few years ago, on a Google+ broadcast, NPR social science correspondent Shankar Vedantam reported that researchers at Harvard Business School no less found that eating rituals, like stereotyped unwrapping of a chocolate bar, enhanced folks' ability to savor the candy. Listeners invited to post their own rituals on Facebook responded that mundane tasks, such as nightly cleansing your face with your mother's brand of face cream, or getting their dogs "in line" each morning, centered them and made them pay greater attention to the moment.

Sound familiar? It should. Two years later, MIndfulness is BIG. Everyone's doing it, aided by body-scan tapes or cushions in lavender-scented rooms. But, you don't need all that stuff. I hope KSDS still runs Coffee with the Chairman, but if they don't, this will do just fine.

1. Download Songs for Swingin' Lovers! on Spotify. 2. Choose a time in your morning that you are most frantic.3. Prepare coffee or beverage of your choice right before.4. For one week, sit down for two minutes at time #2 with #3 and focus solely a cut from #1.